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Well damn .. All the characters were so likeable. Well, except for Nodoka of course, I hated her even on the first season.

What I'm confused about is this relation to the first season. Is this supposed to be a prequel, or a spinoff?

Spinoff from here onward. This episode was a prequel for the entire Saki universe. The timeframe will be the same as in the first series. A true second season for the main series can't be made yet due to manga constraints.

They could've gone anime original for second season, though. I really wish they had too .. I mean just thinking about where the first season stopped is annoying me =_=..

If this anime doesn't stop before they reach the Nationals, I wonder if we'll see any of the 1st season's cast there with Nodoka. If the timeframe is same it could happen unless it's a true spinoff with absolutely no relation to the first season (aside from this episode).

I don't recall the first season being all that interesting, so I can't say I was disappointed by the first 7/8th of this episode. Not interesting with the only thing noticeable being (young) Ako's giant head and (young) Nodoka's voice and appearance, both that are too similar to her older self.
The last part was pretty interesting though, but well, we'll see...

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-R.I.P. Hiroshi Yamauchi, Gaming wouldn't have been the same without you (9/19/13)

Absolutely excellent - a faithful adaptation of the manga and I also enjoyed the VA'ing. Also, I really liked the fact that the BGM had many of the same pieces used in the Saki anime. Helped to re-create a definite sameness of feel imo.

Glad you loved it Flower. Honestly, this episode reminded me of why I fell in love with Saki in the first place. I'm really loving Shizuno, Aka, and Kuro and expect great things from them.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Flower

Looks like they may cover material all the way up through the current manga chapters too ... interesting.

I wonder, what will happen then. Will the series end? Hopefully without another three year wait until more Saki. Might they actually segue into an actual season two of Saki?

Provided that Achiga is only single cour, a season 3 of Saki is basically guaranteed. Achiga (the manga) will be set to wrap up in approximately three chapters with [mod edit: let's leave this for the manga thread] If the anime sticks to the one episode per chapter adaptation pacing, they will precisely cover the entire Achiga sidestory leaving us with another huge cliffhanger to be resolved, with the outcome of the final national's arc of the main Saki story.

Episode one covered an entire 90 pages of content from chapter 1 of the manga sidestory, but not all chapters of the manga are that long (although quite a few are). I am hopeful that for at least the shorter chapters the anime will add more fleshed out details and extra content (still a bit disappointing, given the extremely fast pace of Achiga-hen in general though).

In any case, the material in Achiga-hen is extremely relevant to future developments in the main Saki series. It might be called a "sidestory", but any Saki fan would be a complete fool if they decided to miss it.

The tournament brackets for the interhigh mahjong national's competition are split into two sides, side-A and side-B. Kiyosumi, Eisui, Rinkai, etc. are in side-B. Achiga, Senriyama, Shiratodai, etc. are in side-A.

I never said I hate Nodoka because of that, although it is somewhat true, but it's not the only reason. Misao, you need to start accepting the fact that not everyone will like what you like. I hate her, end of the story.